INTRODUCTORY CHAPTERS XXIX 



WoodlaruL^ to aiiprcciato his words. They were behind a 

 pair of nags, 



"both nearly thoroughbred, 15.2 high, stout, clean- 

 limbed active animals, — the offside horse a gray, 

 almost snow-white — th6 near, a dark chestnut, 

 nearly black — with square docks setting off ad- 

 mirably their beautiful round quarters, high 

 crests, small blood-like heads, and long thin 



manes ribs slightly visible, their muscles 



were well filled, and hard as granite. Their coats 

 glanced in the sunshine — the white's like statuary 

 marble; the chestnut's like high polished copper." 



and at a quarter past six they landed in Hoboken. 



Our conveyance was a Dodge motor, painted yellow 

 picked out with black, and at 1 :45 P. M. we were over the 

 Cortlandt Street ferry and landed on the Jersey shore. 



Forester's road led by the private racecourse of the 

 stanch sportsman, Mr. Stevens, and on the left were 

 "several powerful horses taking their exercise in their neat 

 body clothes." 



Not far away was Castle Point, the home of John C. 

 Stevens; son of Colonel John Stevens, inventor of the 

 steam screw propeller and a contemporary of Fulton and 

 Livingston ; where the Stevens family have held sporting 

 sway for generations. It was John C. Stevens who, on the 

 13th of November, 1822. accepted the challenge of Colonel 

 William R. Johnson, "Napoleon of the Turf", to produce 

 a horse on the last Tuesday in May 1823 to run four mile 

 heats against Eclipse over the Union Course on Long 

 Island for $20,000 a side, $3,000 forfeit. 



As this match is one of the milestones in the Sporting 

 Annals of America, a description of the race from an old 

 document written at the time ma.v be a pardonable 

 digression : 



"On the 27th day of May, 1823, there was no 

 less than thirty thousand assembled on the Union 

 Course — many of these ladies — and certainly on 

 no similar occasion had ever brought so many 

 men of note together in America, — General 

 Jackson, tall, thin and angular, headed a dele- 

 gation from Tennessee; Alston of South Cnro- 

 lina ; and John Randolph of Roanoke, scowling 



